The Last One

Part One

A flashlight beam slashed through the darkness. The team of explorers dressed in protective suits entered the room that had been walled off and separated from the rest of the damaged facility by a pane of glass, the silhouettes of thousands of bodies that appeared to be in a sleeping, reposed state surrounding them on all sides, floating on invisible anti-gravity beds.

"Who are they?" One of the explorers asked, his voice sounding tinny through his communication device inside his suit.

"I'm not sure," their leader said, shining the flashlight on them, examining them. "They appear to be perfectly preserved."

"Are any of them still alive?"

"I'm not sure. I'm not detecting any vital signs."

"What could be the purpose of this place? Was this a hospital of some kind, or a morgue?"

The leader looked around, shining her flashlight on the other immobile bodies. The room where they were kept was the only area of the building that seemed to have survived, remaining intact while the walls outside of it were crumbling in a state of decay and ruin, the building façade mostly a charred remnant, a skeleton of a former structure. Its contents were in various states of disarray, the lab equipment inside scattered and broken, in stages of corrosion and decrepitude. Massive, thick cobwebs formed in the corners, becoming entangled with each other until they formed a long, silken thread, dangling overhead.

"I don't know," she said. "Perhaps they were trying to preserve what was left of their race."

A low frequency, steady beeping erupted on one of their devices, barely audible at first.

"What's that?" One of the other team members asked.

The team member whose device activated followed the sound. It became progressively louder the closer he came to one of the bodies. Curious, he scanned the body, noticing unusually high spikes in the energy output whose origins he couldn't explain or identify.

"Uh Anna, you'd better get over here," he said to the team leader.

Anna approached, along with the rest of her team, standing over the body.

"What is it?" She asked.

The man holding the device frowned inside his suit. "I'm not sure," he said, "but I think this one is still alive. I'm getting an indication of some vital signs, although they're faint."

"How? He isn't breathing."

"That's what I can't understand. He's not breathing, and he doesn't have a pulse, but somehow…he's alive, unless my device is malfunctioning."

Anna studied the body closely. "I've heard of this," she said. "They've been experimenting with methods similar to it on Earth, as a possible answer to our population and habitable issues. It almost looks like cryogenics, but it's not. This appears to be some other highly advanced form of suspended animation. Perhaps I was right. Maybe they did use it to preserve what was left of their race before they were completely obliterated."

"Unfortunately, it doesn't appear that it worked very well to save them," the man holding the device said. "This man appears to be the only one left alive."

"It would be wonderful if that were true," Anna said. "Think of what we could learn from him, about what happened here. Maybe we could prevent something similar from happening on our planet." She looked around at her team. "We have to find a way to revive him."

"If we're going to do it, we'll have to do it soon," the man holding the device said. "His vital signs are growing weaker. If we don't act soon, I'm afraid we'll lose him."

Anna sighed. "All right," she said, trying to concentrate. She looked at her team. "We are going to determine how to revive him, but we're going to have to act quickly. You heard what Brian said. The situation is urgent. I want each of you to work on finding a solution, and soon. I will not allow this being to die. We have to do everything in our power to save him. Is that understood?"

The others nodded silently in agreement.

"Good, now let's not hesitate any longer. Let's begin our work now."

She looked down at the alien, surprised by how humanlike he was. She wouldn't know him by name, not yet, but the unconscious body she stared at was Mork.